Photographed some time ago , maybe late eighties maybe a bit later. Will have to dig out the negative maybe from the files and find a date. All those negatives …. what a prospect! All of them presumably deteriorating infintessimaly day by day until in a few years I will be confronted by a flaking shard of grey ash. From which I might just be able to extract an image if the scanner doesn’t gag at the prospect of being fed such unappatising gunk. so photogenic this pub. On Wardour street and frequented by a mix of punks, goths, men in grey and black – or is that a lie and me just forgetting. Romantasising the past for the sake of a few words on screen. Have always loved this kind of interior. Posters stuck on walls and the whole thing a collage of pop culture icons , text and bright lights. And of course Marilyn. Seem to remember that I had a postcard published of this image a while back. A northern poet who wanted it for his front cover. Phoned me up and said poetry doesn’t pay well and so I’d get a name check if the photo could be used for free. I said sure and was mildly amused – or was it disappointed – to see that he’d misspelt my first name.
Is this a scene from a movie? Maybe. Or more likely a documentary. Maybe one not unlike the recent Time and The City doing for Soho what Davis did for Liverpool. No over ripe fruity voice over though. No cerebral Frankie Howards bemoaning the passage of time. But music and probably classical and choral. A nice juxtaposition as the camera glides in slo mo past the habituees of various drinking establishments. And then the camera just holds steady on this image with the lights on the fruit machine performing neon lit laps that hold your attention for ever and ever.
